This story talks about a new FOTA (firmware over-the-air) standard being developed that would help mobile handset manufacturers release and push firmware upgrades to the millions of handsets they sell every quarter. Although this will be insignificant to the regular press, this new initiative is sorely needed in the mobile handset marketplace.All too often, handsets are released in beta form, whether or not the manufacturers admit. With the maddening production schedule, product life cycle and ever-changing consumer and carrier tastes, mobile handset firmware is sometimes buggy on release just so a handset model can make a deadline. This has been happening in the computer software market since, well, the 80s.
What's important about this story is that there could finally be a solution to push firmware updates over the air to handsets to alleviate the incredibly huge hassle of customers having to return handsets for others and having ill-trained store staffers lumber through the process -- it's inconvenient for everyone.
